It's going to stop! It must!

Over the past few months both the two slaughter houses in Texas and the one in Illinois were shut down by federal court orders. The Texas one due to a law that has existed but not be enforced for decades. The Illinois one due to Congress forbidding tax money to pay for USDA inspectors for the slaughter houses that kill horses. They found a way around it by PAYING the USDA inspectors (which, of course, means "paying OFF") which a federal court ruled couldn't be allowed.

Unfortunately, this past week an appeals court decided that it was a bad thing for the plant to be losing all this business while they appealed the decision so they are allowing them to resume while it's in appeal!

I'm furious but trying to see this as a last ditch effort by people who know they are going down. I'm seriously upset that horses will again die there, but I must believe that it will not be for long! It's unclear if the plant is actually getting their inspectors and able to start up, hopefully that will be delayed. Meanwhile, Illinois has a state bill to make horse slaughter illegal in the state....it's passed the State House, and is in committee in the State Senate which means that this is a good time to talk to your state Senators if you are in Illinois!!!!

There is also the federal Horse Protection Act which will ban not only slaughter in the US all together, but also the TRANSPORTATION of horses for the purpose of slaughter. This is very important because even while there were no operating horse slaughter houses in the US horses were being taken to Canada and Mexico for slaughter. So everyone can contact their Senators and Representatives to please vote for S.311 and H.R.503 respectively.